What Todd takes for granted 3

The most advanced computing in The Face in the Mirror: a transhuman identity crisis world tends to be done in virtual reality.
Naturally the earliest uses of full sensory V.R. technology was for entertainment purposes. The adult entertainment industry was one of the earliest adopters naturally. This stigmatized the technology briefly but so many other uses were found that it did not remain ghettoized as porn technology for long.
Coupled with the point of use manufacturing technology in many industries virtual reality (with highly accurate avatar mapping) is used for "test driving" lots of consumer goods before they are custom made. This is actually the most common use of the technology by the time of the first book.
Education is also a common use. Art and history classes can make virtual visits to museums and historical locations that are much too far away for a real world field trip. They can even be used to visit locations that no longer exist in the real world. Unfortunately since the Caliphates conquest of Europe that includes the Lovre, the Parthenon, the Sistine Chapel and many other notable locations. Fortunately most such locations were preserved in high resolution virtual form before their real world destruction.
Doctors use virtual reality as an interface to control surgical robots both implanted and external with much more precision than they might with more conventional control systems.
Such V.R. telepresence control systems are used even more heavily by the military. Manned fighting vehicles and aircraft have almost entirely been replaced in the military except for personnel transport and large naval craft. Small remote operated robots replace human infantry in many ways sadly fully equipped felis troopers are cheaper than robots and operators.
Of course this only scratches the surface of ways virtual reality is used.